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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23860855">The Project</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/JayneL/pseuds/Jayne%20L'>Jayne L (JayneL)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Picard, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: The Next Generation (Movies), Star Trek: Voyager</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Backstory, Friendship, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Medical Experimentation, Medical Procedures, Psychological Trauma, The Federation isn't perfect, emotions are hard, xBs (Star Trek)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:22:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,573</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23860855</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/JayneL/pseuds/Jayne%20L</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Hugh's backstory from the end of 'Descent Part II' to the beginning of ST:PIC.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Hugh | Third of Five &amp; Beverly Crusher, Hugh | Third of Five &amp; Geordi La Forge, Hugh | Third of Five &amp; Seven of Nine, Hugh | Third of Five/Original Character(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>35</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Project</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>2370-2371</strong>
</p>
<p>Once Lore has been neutralized, the drones he experimented on are beamed up to the <em>Enterprise</em> for assessment. Hugh accompanies them, protective of his cubemates and wanting to check on Geordi, who he heard was experimented on as well.</p>
<p>Beverly is there when he and the others materialize in the transporter room. She gives Hugh his first ever hug, a warm and welcoming hello that he has no idea how to respond to.</p>
<p>Hugh gets his second ever hug from Geordi, whose drawn face brightens when he learns who's visiting his bedside in Sickbay.</p>
<p>Hugh is relieved to learn that Geordi's prognosis is good. But the damage Lore's experiments did to the drones is too extensive: they won't survive. When Beverly tells him, Hugh looks at Geordi--whose limbs twitch occasionally, uncontrollably; whose VISOR ports are dark on his temples, dead, their connection to his brain disrupted; who looks vaguely toward Hugh with a saddened furrow between his sightless white eyes--and thinks of how he refused initially to help Commander Riker rescue Lore's hostages. He thinks of Lore and his followers being allowed to continue their experiments unchecked. He thinks of how close Geordi might have been to being untreatable when Hugh finally chose to act.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>The Federation establishes a base on the planet to assist--and figure out what to do with--the former drones. The <em>Enterprise</em> stays only long enough to brief the incoming taskforce. Before leaving, Picard offers Hugh the opportunity to stay aboard. Hugh is very tempted to stay with Geordi and Beverly, but he feels responsible for his former cubemates and chooses to remain with the colony on the planet.<p>Whatever the Federation's intentions, the taskforce has mixed results. As promised, it provides assistance and relief: supplies, medical treatment, social and mechanical engineering resources. But Starfleet's specialists and scientists don't limit their work to the humanitarian.</p>
<p>Drones are tested on mental acuity, cognition, memory; physical abilities, strength, endurance. Their bodies are scanned. Their implants are examined. Their corpses are dissected.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Some of the former drones are grateful not to have to think too much for themselves, and accept whatever order the Federation wants to impose in whatever way they try to impose it. Some of them don't see what was so bad about Lore and his teachings, actually, and are resentful of being denied Lore's promised evolution. And some of them just can't cope with individualism and self-awareness, and kill themselves.<p>Never very stable to begin with, the situation in the colony deteriorates. Some of the drones object to the taskforce's methods, its priorities, its very presence. Hugh agrees that the Federation's efforts are flawed--gravely flawed, in some frustrating and painful areas--but he's among a small minority of liberated drones who see clearly just how unsuited they are for self-governance in their current state. When the loudest isolationist agitators gain enough support/compliance from the rest of the colony that the Federation's presence on the planet becomes untenable, the taskforce prepares to withdraw.</p>
<p>It's not just the taskforce that's in danger: the agitators also direct their hostility at any former drones who don't share their point of view. Hugh and the other former drones whose safety is at risk petition the Federation for asylum. The Federation takes its time considering their request, leaving them in growing uncertainty and anxiety as the taskforce's departure looms.</p>
<p>When the transport ship <em>Dorset</em> arrives to collect the taskforce, the captain meets with the small contingent of asylum seekers. "The Federation will grant you all asylum," he announces, "under the following conditions:</p>
<p>"You may travel freely throughout Federation space, but you must check in with a Federation representative once a month to provide a record of your current location and activities. If you intend to travel outside Federation territory, you must submit the details of your itinerary and destination to the Federation for approval before you depart. When you arrive at any Federation starbase or member planet, you must register your presence with the governing authority. When you leave, you must advise the governing authority of your departure. You may correspond freely, however any communication with the colony on this planet must be logged with a Federation representative. You are restricted from contacting, visiting, or otherwise accessing the following..."</p>
<p>Remaining with the colony isn't an option. Hugh and the others agree to all terms.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2372</strong>
</p>
<p>Despite the Federation's vaunted ideals, it soon becomes obvious to Hugh and the other liberated drones that it will be impossible for them to live openly in Federation society while they still look like Borg. They decide to get their implants removed.</p>
<p>Hugh discusses options with Geordi and Beverly, who are both very supportive but--due to the <em>Enterprise</em> only occasionally being anywhere nearby--unable to help out much in person. They both mine their respective professional networks as much as they can, and refer Hugh to people who are both able and willing to help.</p>
<p>However, aside from Picard, whose assimilation was thorough but didn't last long enough to be particularly intensive, drone reclamation is a largely untested--even, in some aspects, mostly theoretical--endeavour. Hugh and the others end up letting themselves be experimented on by doctors and scientists of varying repute in the pursuit of successful reclamation techniques.</p>
<p>Some of the surgeries turn out better than others. It's not lost on Hugh that this kind of experimentation is exactly what Lore did, only aimed at the opposite goal.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>When he sees himself in the medically-necessary skintight dermaplastic suit he's given to wear when his armor finally comes off, Hugh has his first ever opinion on fashion.<div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Hugh and Geordi speak frequently over subspace, but they don't cross paths again for a long time. By the time the <em>Enterprise</em> has a layover at the starbase where Hugh's arranging his next surgery, he's changed a lot.<p>So has Geordi. Hugh has seen Geordi's bright new optronic eyes on a commscreen, but in person, he finds them captivating.</p>
<p>Geordi asks if Hugh is pleased with his results so far. He offers suggestions for tweaking Hugh's remaining implants to be more useful and unobtrusive. He recommends the technophthalmologist who gave him his new eyes when Hugh mentions the slow degradation of his own ocular implant. He expresses concern about the psychological impact of Hugh's intense physiological changes. He offers advice on navigating the unfamiliar society Hugh now lives in.</p>
<p>The more time Hugh spends with Geordi--having Geordi's attention and knowing Geordi wants to help him and receiving Geordi's casual touches to his arm and shoulder and back--the more he feels--he feels--</p>
<p>Hugh has no idea what this feeling is.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>The <em>Enterprise</em>'s layover ends and Geordi leaves and Hugh still has no idea what he's feeling, except that for the next week or so he has very little interest in ending his regeneration cycle or leaving his quarters.<div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Another doctor; another surgery; another temporary place to live. The surgery unintentionally interferes with communication between Hugh's cortical node and his ocular implant, rendering the implant unresponsive and leaving Hugh to make do with only his biological eye's dim vision until he can find someone to repair him.<p>This is how, while Hugh is testing his still-uncertain tastebuds in a busy café, he mistakes a man across the room for Geordi. Glimpsed through the crowd, the man's build and skin tone are enough to bolt happy surprise and relief and that mysterious, fluttering something through Hugh's body--followed by disappointment and dismay when the man turns as if Hugh had called his name and reveals himself, clearly, to be someone else entirely.</p>
<p>The man approaches Hugh, which is unexpected. Smiling warmly, which is even moreso. Hugh's experience of being noticed by strangers usually involves distrustful stares or side-eyes from a decidedly wary distance. </p>
<p>The man's name is Adao, and he is Betazoid. "I couldn't imagine who'd be that happy to see me," he says, his voice and his eyes as warm as his smile as he waves off Hugh's apology for disturbing him. </p>
<p>The café is crowded, but there is an empty chair still at Hugh's small table. Adao accepts Hugh's invitation to join him with neither hesitation nor an extra glance at Hugh's visible scars and remaining implants. They exchange small talk while they eat, a little stilted at times, but amiable.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>"You really miss him. The man who looks like me."<p>"Geordi is my friend."</p>
<p>"It's okay, Hugh, you can admit it. I already know what you're feeling."</p>
<p>"You do? Can you tell me?"</p>
<p>"...oh, sweetheart. You really don't know."</p>
<p>Adao tells him. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2373</strong>
</p>
<p>It's like dominoes: first to have their long-dormant Queensense light up is the former Locutus, who has reclaimed the name Jean-Luc Picard; next, once Eighth of Twenty, now reclaimed T'Varil, living with their cousins on Vulcan; then, once Six of Seven, now reclaimed Eun Dak-Ho, reconnecting with a pre-assimilation friend on Jupiter Station; then, once Third of Five, now Hugh, on Earth to meet with Geordi's technophthalmologist and a civilian group that has expressed an interest in drone reclamation. </p>
<p>After the attack, Starfleet scrambles to collect and contain the remnants of the destroyed cube as all of Sector 001 buzzes with new fear and churned-up memories of the first Borg incursion. Hugh stays locked in his hotel room, fingers trembling over his comm controls as he tries to raise every liberated drone who left the colony with him.</p>
<p>The ones who answer his call have the same shocky look Hugh sees in his own reflection every time the screen goes dark. </p>
<p>A sense similar to the Queensense--an awareness just as long-buried--tells him why he can't raise the ones who don't answer.</p>
<p>"I understand why they did it," he confesses shakily to Adao, whose concerned call comes in just after Hugh marks a third unresponsive contact. "I understand, and I can't fault them."</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>The <em>Enterprise</em> engaged the Borg, again, and prevailed against dire odds, again, this time saving not just the sector, but the timeline. While the ship is being repaired at Utopia Planitia, Geordi and Beverly visit Hugh on Earth and tell him all about it.<p>Beverly hasn't seen him since before his last two surgeries. She hugs him tightly and exclaims over his appearance--especially his hair, which is new to Hugh as well--and tells him firmly to contact her, not any of the various people who performed his procedures, if he begins to feel anything is not right. She tells him she wishes she could have provided more hands-on help with his physical reclamation, but that she's proud of him for having figured out what he wanted and done so much to achieve it. </p>
<p>Only the day before, Hugh's head rang with the Queen's echoes, chastising him for having willfully ruined the near-perfection of her drone.</p>
<p>He hugs Beverly again before he realizes he's doing it.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Beverly has a meeting at Starfleet Medical halfway through the afternoon. Hugh isn't glad to see her go, but once she's gone it's just him and Geordi, so he can't truly regret her leaving.<p>He enjoys having Geordi's attention as they talk, having Geordi's ocular implants focused on him, having Geordi smile at him. In the wake of the attack, the Queen, the reminder of how it felt to be many, indistinct, unthinking, compliant--after the threat of having everything he's chosen and achieved for himself undone--to have Geordi look at him as he is now and <em>smile</em>--</p>
<p>Hugh's relief and his fear and his loneliness and his love--his <em>love</em>--jumble together and swell in his chest and overwhelm his thoughts, and he kisses him. </p>
<p>It's Hugh's first kiss. When he thinks about it later, he's grateful that Geordi only went still, and didn't pull away.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Geordi is kind, and gentle, and apologetic. He cares for Hugh very much, but not in the same way Hugh cares for him. He hopes he hasn't hurt Hugh. He wants their friendship to continue. He doesn't want it to change.<p>Hugh's stomach twists and his unscarred cheek burns, but he agrees to maintain their friendship as it is. </p>
<p>He's afraid the only alternative is not to have Geordi at all.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>The civilian group cancels their meeting.<p>With his newly-freed time, Hugh goes to Starfleet Command and refuses to leave until someone speaks to him about the survivors. </p>
<p>The lieutenant at the reception desk gives him a bland smile and a prepared response: "Crew members injured in the battle are being treated on their ships or at Starfleet Medical. Casualties on Earth--"</p>
<p>"No." The lieutenant blinks. Hugh does not. "I want to know about the Borg survivors."</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>By the end of the week, Hugh has founded the Borg Reclamation Project.<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2373-2375</strong>
</p>
<p>The Dominion draws the Federation's attention: priorities shift; members of taskforces are reassigned; resources are reallocated. Hugh does what he can--including gaining Federation citizenship--to keep at least some focus where he and the other liberated drones need it. Geordi, Beverly, and the rest of the board of the Reclamation Project apply pressure where possible, too.</p>
<p>Then war is declared, and there's nothing any of them can do.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>The Dominion destroys the colony.<p>Hugh hasn't returned since he left, and information about how the former drones fared on their own has always been scarce. He knows their numbers have dwindled: some of the former drones who chose initially to stay changed their minds when their hoped-for society continually failed to coalesce, and most of them found their way to the Reclamation Project sooner or later. The last news Hugh received--from a Kressari trader who delivered bare necessities to the planet in exchange for Borg technology he sold at a massive profit--gave Hugh the distinct impression that most of the colony had succumbed to chaos.</p>
<p>But they had been Hugh's cubemates. He's the reason they became individuals; he's the reason the Collective abandoned them. And the ones who stayed in the colony were so many more than the ones who left.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>The war ends.<p>As soon as travel restrictions are eased, Hugh visits Betazed.</p>
<p>He had worried about Adao during the occupation. Adao is a civilian--a musician--and Hugh couldn't imagine the Dominion would find him of much interest, much less a threat. But the number of people who aren't xBs who Hugh considers friends can be counted on the fingers of one Yridian hand; he worried about him anyway.</p>
<p>At the raktajino kiosk where they arranged to meet, Adao turns to greet Hugh as he crosses the boulevard towards him. "You can't be that happy to see me," he calls with his usual smile, looking at Hugh like he expects him to share the joke. </p>
<p>Adao is leaner than he was the last time Hugh saw him. His hair is much longer than Hugh's ever seen him wear it, surrounding his head like a corona. He has grown a full beard. Despite their warmth, his dark eyes are tired. </p>
<p>Hugh's latest ocular implant is state-of-the-art and functioning perfectly. "But I am," he says, and Adao fumbles where he's reaching for a stirrer and knocks over the container.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Hugh's second kiss has a much more pleasing outcome.<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2378</strong>
</p>
<p>Seven of Nine is a sensation: assimilated as a child, reclaimed through heroic and determined Federation effort, embraced by <em>Voyager</em>'s crew, instrumental in bringing that lost ship home. Rumour has it she told the Borg Queen, to her face, to go fuck herself.</p>
<p>She is fascinating. She is striking. She stirs awe and compassion.</p>
<p>She could generate a lot of visibility and goodwill for the Reclamation Project.</p>
<p>Except that she is also wholly unwilling to gloss her identity as a former drone for those who find it challenging or distasteful. When Hugh realizes she would be terrible for the Project's public relations, he can't even be disappointed. He's too busy spending what would otherwise be an intensely boring and uncomfortable reception marvelling as she discomfits and appalls a number of Federation politicians who apparently expected a great deal more humility from Captain Janeway's pet ex-Borg.</p>
<p>It's refreshing to see an xB who's seemingly never had to sanitize herself in order to have her personhood respected.</p>
<p>Cynically, Hugh wonders how long she'll be able to keep that up.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>Hugh and Seven compare notes on their reclamations. Hugh learns that, after the loss of his cube, the Collective implemented new failsafes to keep the drones' potential for individuality more thoroughly suppressed.<p>"Because of me, your cortical node almost killed you when you began recovering your ability to feel strong emotions," he recaps Seven's latest revelation, aghast.</p>
<p>She arches her brow. "Because of you, the Collective was forced to adapt its compliance apparatus and several key elements of the assimilation process. You should be flattered."</p>
<p>When he thinks about it like that, he is.</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <hr/>
</div>"Seven, may I ask a personal question?"<p>"You may."</p>
<p>"Why did you choose to retain your Borg designation?"</p>
<p>"Annika Hansen is a child in a data file. Seven of Nine is ongoing experience and action."</p>
<p>"Annika is who you were; Seven is who you are."</p>
<p>"Yes. May I ask you a personal question?"</p>
<p>"Go ahead."</p>
<p>"Why have you chosen to retain the physical scars left by the removal of your implants?"</p>
<p>"Because the scars are as much a part of me as the implants were."</p>
<p>"Third of Five cannot be cleanly separated from Hugh."</p>
<p>(After leaving the colony, some of the liberated drones started to remember their pre-assimilation identities. Hugh didn't. One day, while hunting through the cube's archives for records of which drone was assimilated from which species so the Federation could start repatriation efforts, he found his own record and discovered why: Third of Five, the product of sperm and egg harvested from genetically compatible drones whose reproductive organs hadn't been removed to make room for cybernetic implants; grown from the resultant embryo in a maturation chamber, with implants grafted into the biological organism at various key stages of development; one of the last drones to have been created in this fashion before the Collective decided to cease in-house production and increase its population solely through assimilation.)</p>
<p>Hugh smiles at Seven's succinct conclusion. "Yes," he agrees.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2385</strong>
</p>
<p>Gaining access to the Artifact is easier than Hugh expected.</p>
<p>Once aboard, he finds out why: while the Romulans in charge are keen to strip the cube and its drones for technology, they are even more invested in reclaiming people and data from a Romulan ship the cube assimilated not long before it suffered submatrix collapse. Their efforts to identify their desired drones and files are hindered by their unfamiliarity with Borg language and organizational structure. Their ready acceptance of the Reclamation Project's petition for involvement is as much about getting access to its xB executive director's knowledge as it is about benefitting from the Project's medical and scientific resources. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2379-2386</strong>
</p>
<p>Icheb is the first xB to be accepted into Starfleet. Seven is proud; Hugh is hopeful.</p>
<p>Seven years later, Icheb is just one of many xBs torn apart in a black market chop shop. </p>
<p>For a time, such crimes were relatively rare: Borg technology was a valuable commodity, but only the most amoral brokers would kidnap and kill to obtain it. </p>
<p>Then the synth ban came into effect. </p>
<p>Strictly speaking, the Borg aren't synthetic life forms. This doesn't seem to matter to those looking for an excuse. </p>
<p>Every time Hugh gets news of another xB who disappeared without a trace--whose corpse was found ripped to shreds--whose death received only cursory investigation, if any, before being filed away and forgotten--he becomes more blackly thankful for the Romulans in charge of the Artifact. Their reclamation surgeries may be aggressive and unsentimental, but they don't treat the people they're harvesting from as disposable.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2387</strong>
</p>
<p>Hugh finds the assimilated Romulans within the Artifact's legions of drones.</p>
<p>The day after he submits his report to Artifact management, a new site director arrives.</p>
<p>Narissa has no interest in the Artifact's day-to-day functions. She doesn't involve herself with any of the site's initiatives. She avoids the xBs as much as she possibly can. The few times she can't escape meeting with Hugh, she barely bothers to hide her disgust.</p>
<p>She's also obviously Tal Shiar.</p>
<p>As the assimilated Romulans begin to be reclaimed--and as more and more of their reclamations result in shells of people who are somehow unable to recover coherent mental function--Narissa's cold disdain transmutes into dismay and despair. She hides it well, as all Romulans hide their weaknesses. But only mostly.</p>
<p>The scarce slips of her grief are enough for Hugh to realize that he and Narissa share the smallest sliver of common ground.</p>
<p>The Disordered break both their hearts.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>2399</strong>
</p>
<p>Thirty years after Third of Five's malfunction, Hugh has made his home on a broken Borg cube.</p>
<p>He speaks with his friends over subspace, and uses his rare, short vacations to visit the ones he misses most.</p>
<p>He plays politics with the Federation, with the Romulans, with anyone willing to entertain the idea that every Borg drone has a person caged inside.</p>
<p>He watches Seven learn to bury her precision and formality under defensive layers of messy humanity.</p>
<p>He listens to Adao's music in his office while he does admin.</p>
<p>He finds names for the Nameless. He gives what limited structure he can to the Disordered.</p>
<p>Consciously now, he does the work of reclamation.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>1) The Project, aka The Ideas I Keep Having For The Hugh Backstory Fic I'm Not Writing.</p>
<p>1a) Ahahahaha.</p>
<p>2) Some of this is sketchier than I want it to be, but it's what I could manage.</p>
<p>3) HUGH LIVES.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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